Wow what a week!! sheesh so much has happened it’s hard to know what to say! This week was full of more adjusting and getting to know the members and the people we teach! It’s been great.
We saw a miracle with prayer this week. As a mission here, we join together everyday at 12:00 noon to pray for the work and to find people to teach and to have unity within our companionships(: it’s rather amazing to see how it affects our day and how well we work that day when we pray vs when we accidentally forget. So anyway.. we were praying one day for the guidance to find those that are prepared by the Lord and then later that day we decided to visit one of our potential investigators, Amanda, that no one had followed up on. When we got to her house she immediately opened up her life story to us and shared with us the trials that her life has been full of. She expressed that during these trials she had prayed everyday for God to take it all away, but she never felt like he answered her prayers. We didn’t know quite how to help her at that exact moment to make it all better, so we just shared with her the Plan of Salvation and helped her to feel of God’s love. She expressed the desire for her son to be baptized but he was only 4 and not old enough yet. And we set up another time to come and see her(:
Later, we were discussing with a member how sometimes it seems God puts trials in our lives if only to remind us to pray and that He’s there. If things are perfect in our lives, a lots of times we forget to pray to Him. When we heard that we immediately thought of Amanda, that amidst all her trials she never stopped praying to her Father in Heaven, even though she didn’t always feel like she got an answer. Her faith helped her to get through those trials. And those trials reminded her to draw closer to her Heavenly Father who loves her! I can’t wait to continue teaching her!
We had to stop teaching our investigator Elsie who was set to be baptized on Feb. 6 🙁 she decided she wasn’t ready for baptism yet.. but we’ll still keep her in our prayers! BUT in lighter news though, we set a date for our investigator Bruce! 🙂 He’s really keen on learning about the gospel and LOVED the Plan of Salvation. You could just see the hope in his eyes when we told him he could be with his family forever! We’re so excited for him! I love this gospel!!
So…. as I expected one of the biggest cultural adjustments here is the food!!! Oh man… I definitely miss my Tex-Mex!! Their salsa here is spaghetti sauce… it’s terrible! and all the Tongans here (AND my companion……) eat HORSE!! Pray for me… 🙏
In other news.. I’ve been able to really use what I’ve learned in the TDM here! This week we implemented the very first Focus 20 list here in Woden!! Woohoo! And we’ve been trying to work a lot more with the Ward Council! Whipping ’em into shape haha nahh It’s really neat to see how these things and exact obedience can truly bring miracles and push the work forward! Sister Stott has been awesome in adding her own ideas and being super supportive in putting this plan into action! It won’t all happen over night and we’re working with the Elders in our ward to also implement it… but, one day this will be incredible!! I love being a missionary(: #hard=holy
Much love,
Sister Swan
PS here’s my address for while I’m here in Woden(: send me Mexican food!
40/98 Corinna St.
Phillip, ACT 2606
Australia
Pics: 1- With our Recent Convert Nana Julie! And Sister Kalonihea!,2- we found a friend whilst tracting… #aussieland
